ohh oregon! part 2

hood river, oregon.....to say it was hard to narrow down the pictures to post here is an understatement. whew....all the natural light and beauty around us. no wonder we kept snapping pictures and taking it all in. here are the rest of the pictures from our travels last week.

while in Portland, we visited the most unbelievable rose gardens. huge. seriously. i wish we could have stayed forever. there were brides taking pictures with their bridal parties, couples having picnics and people slowly walking through the winding paths everywhere. it was true beauty.

next up.....my favorite afternoon of the trip....a day at a little town's arts and craft festival. it was lively but secluded and surrounded by a mountain backdrop and wildflowers everywhere we looked. they had a cute band playing and lots of people eating the homemade sandwiches and huckleberry smoothies on the grass. we wandered around and felt the warmth of everyone. samantha loved getting her face painted and tyler picked out a neat bracelet for me. i wished for endless wildflowers like these in my backyard......

another stop we made while in oregon was to a nearby lavender field. we actually went twice. we picked our own lavender and had fun relaxing while sammy played with their collection of bubbles.

ps. see my mom in the background....

playing with grammy....

our view from where we sat and picked....

samantha's favorite event....a real train ride. to the little town of odell for a pitstop to stretch and buy fresh cherries and sodas.




eating cherries in the grass while we waited to board the train again....

poor sammy got a bad cough while we were away and we had to have her doctor call in a prescription and a nebulizer for our little sugar plum. she was a trooper for her breathing treatments and nothing stopped her from being a happy little girl.

hanging out at grammy's house....sidewalk chalk and fun in the driveway just like at home!

a big hike for the boys and pam one early morning....





a picnic snack at this neat, grassy beach by the water where everyone kite boards and wind surfs. it is the wind surfing capital and man was it cool to watch. they were everywhere i dont know how they didn't run into each other.

lots of wine tasting while we were away....(well not for me, oh well, hehe)

this winery was the most beautiful out of the ones we visited AND it had a very friendly black lab that helped sammy who missed her colebaby so much!

cheers!

Glad to be back and that our flights were so smooth. couldn't have asked for a more content little toddler sitting cramped on that airplane too. funniest part was during our layover on the way home we ran into our good friends Allison and Anthony and not only got to visit in the airport but we sat in the same row on the way home!

Now its back to reality for us and especially for sammy mac who hasn't adjusted to NOT sleeping with her mommy and daddy in bed (like she did on vacation). here's hoping she will get back to her old sleeping habits and that all of our unpacking will magically happen on its own. hehehe.